RTW with Noah on a KTM 690

I thought you were pretty cool before the " So I Married an Axe Murderer" reference. Now you are a few notches up. Thanks for the laugh man.

PLEASE tell me you brought your camera!



Glad to see everything is still going strong. Enjoy Georgia.


Cord

i want pics of that

So...Slayer fan or not, Noah (or should I call you Kerry King)? I'm confused by all this mixed messaging.

So.. I had an amazing day snowboarding today. Bought a season pass for about $300.


Fresh snow.. about foot of "blower pow". Blue-bird day. I am sore and happy now.

This place is not quite as big as BigSky or Baker but it would give Bachelor a run for its money. Also.. the lift lines are quick... but people in the lift lines merge like they drive. TOTAL SHITE FREE-FOR-ALL.

And this is the view from the top.

looks amazing. Went through snow towns in the Pyreneese a couple of years ago but it was the summer so no snow around.. Would of been nice to see it in the winter, was like a ghost town...i'll just have to imagine it looks like what you posted :)

Alright! Been looking forward to this segment!

ENJOY THE SHRED FOR THE NEXT FEW MONTHS!!! THROW SOME POW SLASHES FOR ME.. LATERS FLETCH

At the advice of a friend, I started yesterday at Page 1 and read your ride report to date. What a great trip and ride report that you have let us follow Noah. Have fun and be safe boarding. I look forward to reading about your journey as it continues to unfold.

Nothing wrong with that..

Man I love that view ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

u will be able to start using straightners on that beared soon mate ha ha

Go back and see! I bet it is beautiful!

You and me both

Done and done. You can count on me Fletch! Sorry about your broncos.. hope you aren't still hung over from drinking away the memories of that loss

Welcome to the circus!

Yup x2!

Yes. the beard is getting LONG. Still undecided about how the Georgian/Russian/Ukrainian snow bunnies feel about it. But it sure looks good covered with snow!

Especially the frozen snot part!

When do you anticipate getting back on the road? Do their winters drag on into May? And do you have a planned route to follow?

I'm told I can snowboard until late April/early May here. I am also told that I should explore Georgia some in the spring before I continue on. My route in the spring will be Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan (again), Russia, Mongolia, Russia to Magadon.

I think I want to be in Mongolia by July and leave most of August/September for Russia. I haven't really begun looking at routes yet. I will spend some time looking at ride reports and such this winter.

I want to start in Vladivostok sometime in May and ride west to Portugal or England.I want to go through Mongolia.But I'm somewhat concerned about few roads and lots of sand in remote wilderness alone.I'm sure I will go that direction though.

Are there things you want to see in all these countries? Or are you just going to see what's there?

Have you read this report? I point her in a direction and go.

Like I said, I need to do some more research and get some GPS tracks. I like to leave my self plenty of time so I can detour if needed. I am still pissed that I rushed through the Balkan countries but I'm loving Georgia now.

So yeah, Keep in touch and we can drink some vodka some where and have a rest day when we pass on the road.

Dec. 25 Merry Christmas in Larissa!
On Christmas Eve I was taken out by Val. She wanted to show me Larissa and show me traditional Greek drinks. We drank rakomelo. Which is a liqure made from grapes that the put honey in and serve it to you warm in a small jar. You keep pouring “shots” to sip. Yamas! After a few rounds of these.. it was beginning to be a great Christmas.



In the morning we hung out and about 1 the whole family got together for a feast. I am not joking about feast. There was rosted pork, chicken stuffed with peppers, turkey, stuffing, soup, bread, home-made wine, beats, and of course tziki sauce! We chatted for a while. A few of the dozen or so that were there spoke English. Its always interesting to have people ask questions through a translator then wait watch them light up when he/she explains to them. Then 5 more questions come back. I'm getting a very good feel for the order of questions people ask. Where are you from? Where have you been? How long have you been traveling?.... If I can explain those.. its usually followed by How rich are you? I explain that I am a bank robber and I go from city to city until the money runs out. This usually gets a laugh and they don't ask that question again. But in this family, they didn't care about that. They wanted to hear about where I have been and where I am going. What Morocco, Italy, Scotland, Canada and the US is like. Later in the day I noticed the little ones playing Legos. I am a firm believer that Legos are the best toys on the planet and they teach so many basic skills about spacial knowledge. The little kid was 6 or so? But we made this huge tower together. After a few rows he understood to overlap bricks to make the structure stronger and could finish any row that I started. We built the tower as tall as we could then made it into a wind turbine. The next day his mother said he wouldn't stop talking about what we had built. That night Val and I met her sister out for a few more drinks. We walked around the city and took some picture. I even caught my family back in Minnesota at my grandparents house just before their feast. If I couldn't be with my own family, this was certainly the best alternative ever. I now feel like Greece is another spot I will need to go back and visit.


Part of the family who adopted me


Grandpa




I was told this guy is from Russia. I will have to find one when I am there.


It was obvious who I had to let sign Greece.












Sisters!




On the walk home. She said she always smells these flowers..

Dec. 26 Larissa to Thessaloniki Greece. 167 km
We said our good byes and Val signed Greece on the moto. I was on the road by about noon and got into Thessaloniki about an hour before dark. I tried to stay off the toll road but its actually quite hard to do. I found “The Little Big House” hostel in the internet the night before and put it in my GPS. Finding it in real life proved to be much more difficult. Thessaloniki is full of one-way streets and all sorts of craziness. The more you get into the hills the less reason or rhyme they have. They get very small also. The hostel didn't have private parking but it was a dead end street so I locked her to a pole out front. I met a kid from Australia at the hostel the plan was to get dinner. He was supposed to catch a bus at 6 or 7 in the morning. I was not the instigator but 1 turned into many and we didn't get back to the hostel until 3 in the morning. I blame the Greek woman. They were just to gosh darn good looking.


The hostel

Dec. 27 Thessaloniki
I slept in then walked around the town some. Got a hair cut and some things I needed. That night I went out with another guy from the hostel. He was from India but was living in Germany. Again it turned into a late night. Later then anticipated. I think Thessaloniki is a time warp. If you go have dinner at 7 or 8.. before you know it.. it's 4 in the morning. No regrets. This was a fun town.






There's a trash dumpster under this pile somewhere. The garbage collectors were (are?) on strike.


Our nice bar tender






Old old old KTM ADV. Notice the forks...


My new police friends. The guy in the center is inmate "desperado". Thanks for the good convo and the picture!



Dec. 28 Thessaloniki to Asprovalta Greece. 193 km
Around mid morning I checked out of the hostel and started to ride. I wanted to get some spare tubes because after the flat in Albania, I had no spares. I found a motorcycle tire shop called “OK Tire” and I ended up buying new tires and tubes. The price was right. T-63 in the rear and a Karroo 2 up front. I felt a bit bad taking the 908 off the rear because it still had a couple thousand kms left in it but I was told by a friend that Turkey is very expensive for tires. The guys at the shop were great. They fed me and gave me coffee before I left. Thanks!
I wanted to do motorway toward Turkey but I took a wrong turn leaving Thessaloniki and didn't realize I was driving south instead of west for about 80 km. This took me onto a peninsula that actually had some very nice mountains. When the sun was out, it was warm but closer to evening it started to get very cold and foggy. So I ended up only going about 80 km from Thessaloniki after riding 190. I stayed the night in a side-of-the road cafe/hotel.


The host at the hostel. I invited her to dinner but her family was in town for the holidays.


The crew at the tire shop.


yum yum.


New front


New rear


Tires removed. Front was shot. Rear still had some miles. oh well.


I'm not sure why we are angry but sometimes you have to YELL!


Fog in the trees.

Dec. 29 Asprovalta to Feres Greece 294 km
Up early to rain. When the rain stopped the wind started. There were times when my bike was at 45 degrees. I left the motorway and went on small roads for most of the day to try and stay in shelter. I found a hotel in Feres Greece. The hotel had a court yard with a locking gate so the moto was safe. Dinner was brick oven pizza made from a fat-bald German man who chain smoked like crazy. He would light one cig then start talking and it would burn down to the butt and he would light another. Quite funny. It was very windy and cold that night.


Coastal town stop for coffee.

Dec. 30. Feres Greece to Istanbul Turkey 286 km
It was about 15 km to the border when I started. I made sure I got fuel in Greece. As expensive as the fuel is in Greece, I knew that Turkey has the highest fuel prices in the world right now. It was not as windy as the day before but still very cold. In the evening I made it into Istanbul and found my friend Tolga's (Mudfrog) house. Istanbul is a crazy place to ride. Very steep hills and very small streets. Not many people ride motos so the cars don't really respect the space. One would think with fuel prices the way they are, more people would ride motos and scoots. But its mostly just the delivery people on scoots.


This guy is on his second year riding. He started in South Africa and is now peddling into Turkey. The wind was blowing me around, I can't imagine what it would have been like on a pusher.

Upnext: Newyears in Istanbul and riding through Turkey and Georgia.